


Reunion of Master and Padawan

by Merfilly



Series: Growing Up Jedi [15]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-07
Updated: 2017-02-07
Packaged: 2018-09-22 17:43:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9618380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: Mara makes it to the target, and finds Mace is free and present. What he shares with her, though, will shake her foundations.





	

[We still do not know where Malachor is.]

Artoo's logic broke through Mara's contemplation as they wrestled the aging _Aethersprite_ into the air and away from the planet. Echo had not been happy, but he also knew what it was to be rescued when there had been no hope left. If Mara could be that hope for his extended _aliit_ and chain of command, he was going to give her the tools to do so.

"How good at convincing Arseven to play nice with you are you?" Mara said, rubbing her throat and pushing a little more energy to healing the last of the bruising there.

Artoo gave a skeptical beep, but eventually brightened. [Will do anything to protect Snips. Using that as leverage should make it work.]

"Then do that. I've got a vague direction to head because of the Force. You monitor Arseven, and when he knows the exact coordinates, we're going to try and beat them there." Artoo beeped skeptically at her and she smiled. "Hey! You're uncle Anakin's astromech. Are you telling me you haven't learned how to shave time off hyperspace jumps in all these years?"

The droid didn't reply, but started using his manipulators to tune and enhance the ship's thrusters, networking with the hyperdrive ring to push in all of the programming tweaks he could remember to make it work the best if possibly could.

+++

The planet looked forbidding to say the least. Mara could feel a wave of cold, grasping energy below her as she set the scanners to looking for any sign they were on the right place. Her instincts said yes, but she wasn't finding anything to confirm that.

"We have to risk it, Artoo. Mom's _Ventator_ will be popping up any moment now, and I need to be out of the skies before that happens."

[Still not sure you being here alone is a good idea.]

"I'm not alone, Artoo; I have you," Mara answered, bringing her descent to near what looked to be a hole in a shield of some kind.

She was able to slip inside, and her sensors pinged the presence of two ships, at least, soothing some of her fears that she was in the wrong place, and starting others.

However, the fear was completely controllable, as Mara felt, very clearly for the first time in too many days, the presence of her Master.

Mace Windu was here, and he was very intent on making things play in his favor. Mara grinned, almost viciously, as she maneuvered to stay out of those two ships' sight and make her way further in on foot.

+++

"Pretty certain I said to stay behind," Mace said as Mara slipped between broken pieces of walls and statues to get to his side.

"Pretty certain you taught me that a Jedi trusts in the Force, too," she said firmly. "Master," she added more mildly.

"Remind me to tell Ponds to stop nudging the Force where my line is concerned," Mace answered that. "He's safe, Mara. I asked him to go high, to be eyes in the sky, if at all possible."

"Good to hear. Now the bad news? My uncle and his padawan were abducted from Naboo, Mom is probably en route tracking them, and oh yeah, by the way, the former Chancellor has back doors into my uncle's head still," Mara told him, bringing him up to speed.

"Hmm, must be the ship that came to meet Dooku that landed a day ahead of you." Mace looked at her. "And you know that last how?"

"Because… I think I'm Force-bound to him, maybe because of the vision? The Chancellor, not my uncle." Mara tipped her head. "Should have been at least two days ahead of me, even allowing for Artoo — he stayed with my ship — helping me shave time to get here."

"Likely made a stop somewhere to lay another nasty trap. I'm not so sure about that idea, that it is the vision." Mace settled a hand on her shoulder as they knelt behind their chosen cover, his eyes meeting hers. "I am beginning to suspect, Mara, that you were foreseen by the Sith, and when their plans slipped… I fear your family, your city, was manipulated to put you in the heart of the very family unit that the Sith needed to disrupt."

The blood drained from her face as Mara felt those words sink into her. She could not remember the earthquake, really only knew her birth parents as a couple that were kind to her on rare visits that Mom had insisted happen when she was younger. Her earliest memories were bonding to her dozens of uncles, being cradled on a hip with her hands grabbing onto lekku for added support and being indulged in it, of riding on the shoulders of her Dad so she could see everything.

"That's the real reason you told me to stay behind? It's not Uncle Anakin that's the time bomb, but me?"

She thought of that visceral feeling of her lightsaber (not a purple one) cleaving through Luke with all her strength and emotionally charged savagery. 

"It could be both," Mace conceded. "And there's still Galen Marek to take into account. I haven't been able to glimpse anything of him in the shatterpoints. It's almost as if he represents a completely different path than the one you are part of."

Mara wrestled with the idea she could bring harm to her family, then found her steel inside her soul. "I have something they couldn't have anticipated, Master. I have you, when everyone knows you and my uncle never saw eye to eye."

Mace's lips twitched at that understatement. "You have a plan?"

"I think so."

"That's as bad as trying, my padawan," Mace said, not without some humor in his voice.

"I'm old enough to know the truth of that adage, Master. And I will give my all to this plan, even if it fails us." She drew in a deep breath, then let it out very slowly, before closing her eyes. "Meditate with me, Master, so we can prepare?"

"Why do I have the feeling I really am not going to like this plan?" Mace wondered aloud, but he gave himself over to meditation with her, beating back the darkness that crept closer to them both to give them the shielded time they needed to communicate silently, and prepare for the coming shatterpoints as best they could.


End file.
